DMCA

FMC has been closely monitoring the Subcommittee’s ongoing review of the Copyright Act, with special attention to musicians’ needs and perspectives. Here’s a chronology of events so far, with links to our coverage and commentary, along with video of the archived hearings.

Here at FMC, we regularly engage in a kind of protracted dialog with government through public comments and other filings that can extend over years (actually, thirteen and counting!). While we don’t claim to have all the answers, we do believe that our history of direct engagement with musicians, composers, independent labels, publishers, PROs, unions and others is useful for policymakers to consider as they grapple with the many questions facing creators in the digital age.

On Wednesday, Nov. 14, 2013, FMCfiled comments with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) regarding their recent “green paper”—itself a product of the Internet Policy Task Force comprised of USPTO, the Department of Commerce and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration. Way back in 2010, we filed comments in the original proceeding that resulted in this year’s report, Copyright Policy, Creativity, and Innovation in the Digital Economy [PDF].

Future of Music Coalition filed the following comments with the United States Patent and Trade Office (USPTO) in an inquiry related to a previously published “green paper” from the Internet Policy Taks Force (a joint effort also including the United States Copyright Office and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration).

This just in (again): if you’re an online service provider and want to enjoy safe harbor protections under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), you’ve got to play by the rules.

That’s the lesson storage locker service Hotfile learned the hard way when it was sued by all five major motion picture studios (Disney Enterprises, Inc., Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation, Universal City Studios Productions LLLP, Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc., and Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.) in the Southern District Court of Florida. U.S. District Court. In her ruling on Aug. 28 (and just recently made public), Judge Kathleen Williams found that Hotfile could be held liable for the infringing material users uploaded to its site.

On Wednesday September 18, The House Judiciary Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, and the Internet held a hearing to discuss “The Role of Voluntary Agreements in the U.S. Intellectual Property System.”

Uh-oh, did we lose you already? Hearings always sound boring; they don’t have punchy names like SXSW panels, but we promise this one was relevant to musicians, fans, and Internet users. Keep reading. read more

Having had time to digest a 100+ page report on digital copyright policy, we can report back that this “green paper” covers a range of issues around copyright and technology with an understanding of the complexities for creators. The report is a product of the Department of Commerce’s Internet Policy Task Force (IPTF) with input from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA). We wouldn’t say that the green paper is a good beach read — and not just because it’s after Labor Day — but it does lay out very clearly the challenges and opportunities of the digital marketplace.

Of course, we’re mostly concerned about how these issues impact musicians and composers. This is why we’re also delighted to announce that one of the contributors to this report, Shira Perlmutter, Chief Policy Officer and Director of International Affairs at USPTO, is going to give a keynote at the Future of Music Summit (Oct. 28-29, Georgetown University, Washington, DC). Don’t miss the chance to hear from the horse’s mouth about how executive branch agencies are dealing with the issues that impact YOUR livelihood — registration is open now (with a limited number of musician scholarships available)!

Last week, the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, and the Internet wrapped up the second of a pair hearings focusing on innovation and copyright. Both of these hearings were part of the subcommittee’s ongoing review of existing copyright law; the latest was titled Innovation in America: the Role of Technology. read more

On Thursday, May 16, the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Intellectual Property, Competition Policy and the Internet held a hearing entitled “A Case Study for Consensus Building: The Copyright Principles Project.”

FMC’s written testimony, which was submitted to the Committee for the official record, makes the basic point that creators must be included in future hearings, as their perspectives will help inform any apparaisal of the impact of existing (or proposed) rules. We also examine specific issues that we believe the Committee should examine in the course of its review of current copyright law.

On Thursday, May 16, the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Intellectual Property, Competition Policy and the Internet held a hearing entitled “A Case Study for Consensus Building: The Copyright Principles Project.”

Witnesses included Pamela Samuelson (University of California at Berkeley Law School); Jon Baumgarten (former General Counsel of the U.S. Copyright Office); Laura Gasaway (University of North Carolina Law School); Daniel Gervais (Vanderbilt Law School Intellectual Property Program); and Jule Sigall (Assistant General Counsel for Copyright at Microsoft). All of the panelists contributed to the Copyright Principles Project and its 2010 report [PDF].

FMC’s written testimony, which was submitted to the Committee for the official record, makes the basic point that creators must be included in future hearings, as their perspectives will help inform any apparaisal of the impact of existing (or proposed) rules.

[…]“Most of the focus is going to be on the internet,” said Casey Rae, co-executive director of the Future of Music Coalition, of the Congressional review and possible legislative push. “A lot of this will have to do with the economics of digital distribution” of music and video, and the status of so-called orphan works (copyrighted material whose owners cannot be located or have passed away) he said in an interview. The non-profit coalition represents performing artists. read more